Madame Guillotine at GM

Driving in to work today, the local news was reporting that GM salaried employees had been told to cancel vacation plans to come in today ("Black Tuesday"), and they had also been told to drive their GM vehicles to work.

The "drive your GM vehicle to work" part sounds strange and ominous. Is the point of this to shame GM employees who don't have company vehicles? If any GM guys read this blog, can you comment?

I have heard that the cuts today are a relatively small number, less than 500 employees, and that more firings* will come in April.

Update: As this post from GMInsideNews shows, GM was in fact repossessing lease cars on the spot. Cold.

Black Tuesday: Most of the conference rooms booked by human resources. Cabs scheduled to arrive in the morning to take those home with company vehicles that will no longer be employed and able to drive home. Have resume handy, you may interview for your own job. Those traveling or on vacation were asked to return to be available at work on Tuesday.

*"Layoffs" are when hourly unionized workers are told not to come to work, but still collect a large portion of their pay due to union benefits, and their contract. Salaried workers are not laid off, they are fired.